Well & Truly

“First of all, I think it’s been totally consistent. But here’s what’s been consistent: We killed Soleimani, the number one terrorist in the world by every account, bad person, killed a lot of Americans, killed a lot of people.” Donald J. Trump

Another day in America, another nonsensical statement from King Donald I. Unhinged is the new normal in the nation’s capital. At the rate we’re going, it won’t be long before we see fistfights on the floor of Congress, as was common in the 19th century. Perhaps this isn’t a bad thing. I’d pay good money to see someone knock Mitch McConnell over the head with a walking stick. The man from Kentucky is a toad, and deserves a serious ass-kicking, as do most of the spineless members of the GOP’s Trump Cult.  

I was unaware that Qasem Soleimani was the No. 1 terrorist in the world. I thought that title belonged to Bibi Netanyahu. 

You have to admire the ingenuity of the US when it comes to naming unpleasant acts like assassination, torture and kidnapping. Targeted killing and enhanced interrogation techniques and extraordinary rendition sound more sophisticated. Upstanding nations like the US and Israel and Saudi Arabia would never engage in barbaric conduct like assassination, torture and kidnapping....

Believe that and you may as well believe every one of the more than 15,000 false and misleading statements that have tumbled from Trump’s mouth over the last four years. 

Call me naive, but I was astounded by the US response to the Iraqi parliament’s recent vote to expel all US military forces from the country. The State Department had the gall to make the preposterous claim that the US is a force for good in the Middle East. Try selling that line in Syria or Libya or Yemen. And then the US went full mob boss and told the Iraqi government that all its money held in US banks would be frozen if US forces were expelled. I was under the impression that Iraq was a sovereign nation rather than a US colony. Obviously, I was wrong. I forgot that the US never leaves. 75 years after World War II, US forces remain in Germany and Japan and Italy and Korea, ostensibly for the protection of these nations. Sure. And climate change is a hoax cooked up by the Chinese.  

I’ve never been to Iraq and have never met an Iraqi, but I started imagining a boy who was ten years old when the US launched shock and awe in 2003. To that point, his life revolved around his Baghdad neighborhood, his school, his family, and playing football with his friends. Then the US attacks. Cruise missiles and laser-guided munitions rain down, the ground shakes and fires burn across the city. He must remain indoors, away from the windows. His mother cries softly, his father curses Saddam, curses the US, curses his fate for being born in this country. The boy’s father wishes he could take his family to Canada or Sweden, someplace where it’s safe to venture outside and the electricity remains on. The father lived through US economic sanctions. He knows deprivation firsthand; he knows death, having lost a brother in the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980’s. Saddam Hussein was a butcher, but at least under the regime food was plentiful and life had a semblance of normalcy and predictably. It was possible then to hope his son would have an easier life. What could he hope for now? The boy is terrified all the time, afraid to leave the house. 

Americans are conditioned to ignore the suffering of others. American lives matter more, have more value, so what if we kill half a million Iraqis? Or thousands of Afghans? American violence is always justified, cloaked in righteousness, for are we not the world’s champion of freedom and democracy? We’re the good guys. The red, white and blue avengers.  

Right. If only the historical record backed our rhetoric, but it doesn’t, not by a long shot. Haiti, Panama, Grenada, Guatemala, Argentina, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Syria, the list of countries we’ve invaded or meddled in is very long and very bloody. Under the Trump regime we have achieved full rogue nation status. Trump broke the closet door and now we openly, brazenly, enthusiastically, side with tyrants, dictators and zealots. 

In the immortal words of Hunter S. Thompson, “We are well and truly fucked.”